Age becomes her

When casting his latest film, the director Matthew Vaughn wanted his female baddie to be "absolutely an iconic beauty". He knew exactly who it should be - a woman he had idolised since he was a teenager. So Vaughn got on a plane, flew to San Francisco, drove out to the chic, rural suburb of Palo Alto - all bookshops, alfresco Italian restaurants and expensive modernism - to the home of the woman whom scientists have described as the apotheosis of feminine facial beauty. She was knocking on the door of 50, taking a long break from work to concentrate on family life - a husband of 14 years and a teenage son and daughter - and keeping horses, miniature donkeys and lots of dogs in the countryside. The role he wanted her to take was that of the evil Lamia, a chillingly powerful witch desperate to find the fallen star (Claire Danes) whose heart